Last week I attended a conference in Naples which featured a number of terrific speakers on philanthropy in America. The highlight for me was meeting S. Truett Cathy, the founder of Chick-Fil-A. What an amazing man! He has made it clear throughout all his success that he is just seeking to honor God. His statement to close on Sundays is a testament to values and honoring God first and making a buck second. But he’s shown that there is still plenty of room to make a buck. I felt like an 8th grade basketball player going up to meet Michael Jordan. Mr. Cathy couldn’t have been more gracious. I feel fortunate to have met him. My interaction with him has made me feel more resolute about patronizing his restaurant at the expense of McDonald’s. This, of course, was made all the much easier by the new campaign from McDonald’s with billboards saying “Open on Sundays”.

As much as I admire Mr. Cathy, this blog is not about him or Chick-Fil-A. It’s about a debate that I watched at the same conference between Paul Brest, the CEO of the Hewlett Foundation and Bill Schambra, Director of the Bradley Foundation. I invite you to read Paul’s blog and my reply to the tension between the two camps one advocating deep strategic analysis before giving and the other advocating a practice of “write the darn check” is as follows:

I was at the debate in Florida and profited from hearing both views. It’s hard to argue with having a strategic approach to philanthropy….though Bill gave it a good shot. I am a firm believer in what I think applied strategic philanthropy requires: strong measurement of the outcome…...ROI in other words.

I am also a believer though, that it’s often the smaller, indigenous groups without a well formulated strategy and access to grant writers, that are most effective at reaching target populations. I think of the DurhamEagles a youth football program in Durham that reaches 220 kids, 90% of whom live under the poverty line, but who with the help of the Eagles have 2x the graduation rate. They do all of this with just $25,000 in operating budget. That’s $113 per kid! They get to that level because they are small, nimble and staffed by caring/motivated volunteers without staffers or overhead. They need to be better at planning, no doubt (and that’s what we at durhamcares.org aim to do). But they also need someone who will (as in Bill’s words) “write the darn check”

So for me, the answer is somewhere in the middle of both views, though admittedly closer to Paul’s. The challenge we have though is to shepherd smaller, effective organizations along a path towards strategic planning in a way that doesn’t compromise their effectiveness or their return.

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